


Flutterings

by peppermint_smile, raffinit



Category: The Last of Us
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fecundity Kink, Feels, Joel has two heads and only so much blood, Mild Lactation Kink, Pregnant Sex, Tess is in serious denial
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 21:37:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9091723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peppermint_smile/pseuds/peppermint_smile, https://archiveofourown.org/users/raffinit/pseuds/raffinit
Summary: They both saw the lie for what it was.





	

Tess didn’t really notice anything at first, just that her stomach muscles were becoming less defined.

Sure, also new was her heightened sense of smell and a sour, lingering nausea that seemed to roil and curl down the back of her throat at odd times of the day -- but random bouts of various illnesses were not uncommon since the outbreak. Any medicine to be found was likely years old, expired and completely useless, since the precious little that FEDRA still churned out in the old, dilapidated factories just outside the walls of the QZ were mostly kept for distribution amongst the orphanages and the military barracks.

“Well, maybe ya oughta lay off those jerky strips you’ve been hoardin’ all of a sudden,” Joel said from the kitchen table. He didn’t look at her, his brow furrowed in concentration as he carefully cleaned his 9mm with a grimy, threadbare rag.

Tess took another stick of the dried beef from the rations box and tore into it, tossing the oily wrapper onto the countertop. “Maybe,” she sighed, poking at her stomach as she chewed thoughtfully on the briny, leathery meat. 

But still, it continued to grow.

\----

 

Tess woke early in the morning, dim gray light seeping through the broken window slats. She glanced at the rumbling form in bed beside her -- Joel was facing away from her, the huge muscles of his back rippling under the covers as he snored like a bear. She licked her lips and pulled the thin blanket up higher so that it covered her shoulders. She could feel her stomach sticking up; she didn’t know if it was because she _knew_ it was, or if it was actually bothering her.

She breathed in deeply and snaked her hand under the covers, placing it against the lower part of her abdomen before skirting it over her stomach. It was rounded -- bloated, but not quite. The skin was stretched and slightly tight, but still pliant under her fingers. It felt strange. She pressed down on it lightly, but whipped her hand away as if it had burned her when she felt a flutter inside.

It passed quickly though, so quickly she thought she must have imagined it. Tess ghosted her fingertips down the smooth skin of her middle one last time, then tugged the hem her tank top back down.

She did her best not to touch it after that.

\----

 

She didn’t much like their bathroom, because of the dirty, clouded mirrors that seemed to reflect too much, but at the same time it was an escape. She didn’t like the reminders of how swollen her stomach was getting, how rounded. She didn’t look _fat_ , exactly, but more… Tess shook her head. She wouldn’t think about that.

Joel didn’t join her in the shower anymore, during the few days of the week that the water was turned on for a few precious hours. He was a perceptive bastard when he wanted to be; perhaps he knew something was going on with her and she needed that time to herself, needed time away from his lingering gazes and the _fluttering_.

Tess stood under the sputtering spray, the murky water cascading down over her skin. She scrubbed the tiny sliver of rationed soap down her arms, taking great care to avoid her protruding midsection. She hated the way it stuck out and how the rivulets of water curved with it.

She paused though, gazing downward. Had it gotten even bigger? It felt heavy and full and so goddamn tight, the soft flutters grazing inside of her. Closing her eyes and breathing in, she wondered for a moment... was there something _inside_ her?

She couldn’t... No. No, it was ridiculous. She bit her lip worryingly and tried to remember when her last period had been. Years of shitty, rationed food and endless hustling while she built up her lucrative smuggling ring right under the noses of the military had run her ragged, kept her already naturally thin frame slightly underweight and wiry and made her periods irregular at best.

“Y’gotta eat more, Tess,” Joel always had a habit of saying, rumbling it into her neck as they pressed skin-to-skin under the covers. His fingertips would dance over the sharply angled peaks of her hipbones. “Can feel you wastin’ away on me.”

She let out a shaky breath. Oh god, _Joel_.

If this was -- if she was really -- fuck, she couldn’t even bring herself to _think_ it.

(Though somewhere, buried deep within the confines of her mind, there was an inkling. _Yes_ , it whispered, _you know._ )

This would ruin them, she thought, swallowing thickly. They’d always tried to be careful when they fucked, pulling out at the very last minute just before he would spurt almost viciously; thick, white ropes that splattered hot and sticky across her breasts and thighs. But hell, she knew they weren’t perfect every time.

And, Jesus Christ, she knew about Sarah. She knew what her death had done to him, knew the source of the nightmares that plagued him constantly and left him gasping for respite. It was why she never asked questions when he would sometimes disappear, days going by before he would reappear suddenly at her door, reeking bitterly of whiskey and sadness and without a single proffered word of explanation.

He would not want this, she thought, he would never again want to be a --

Out of nowhere, something moved. Tess let out a gasp, her hands flying to her middle before she knew what she was doing. It hurt almost, a kick or a thump or an otherwise undeniable _movement_ inside her tight, swollen belly.

She clutched either side of her stomach and swallowed a lump inside her throat. She pressed gently at first, but then a little harder, and then a little harder still when she felt nothing. Then -- there. A bulge, small and faint but unmistakable, pressed outward briefly before rippling across her abdomen. She yanked her hand away as if it had lurched out of her belly like a sci-fi monster bursting through her chest; uncertain, afraid, unwilling almost to know more about this alien sensation growing in her belly. Still, there was that part inside her that couldn’t leave it well enough alone - it was her own body, after all. These changes were hers, whether she liked it or not.

She wasn’t sure if she liked it or not.

Hesitantly, she allowed herself to run the barest whisper of her fingertips over her stomach again. Soft, at first, barely anything at all, but the ticklish sensation only made her tingle in the most childish ways. So she pressed harder, stroked her skin in genuine touches, probing and searching, nearly palpating her rounded belly for more signs of life. She became pointedly aware of the fact that her nipples were hardening the more she touched her belly, the tingling, ticklish sensation warming and pooling somewhere low in the cradle of her hips.

Her fingers stuttered over a particularly stiff spot on her belly, low in her hips; a flutter of movement not hers.

Without a doubt, there was something there.

God, there was something there, and it was _Joel’s_.

A heat flushed through her without warning, followed immediately by a delicious tingle that seemed to shoot straight from her clit to the very tips of her fingers. She fell forward, pressing a hand against the cool tile of the shower wall to steady herself. Crossing her thighs together and squeezing, she gasped at the slickness between them, her belly popping out as she breathed in. Her lips fell open as she uttered a moan, quiet and low. She couldn’t understand why, she didn’t want to know why, but between her legs she was wet and her clit ached to be touched.

The hand that wasn’t being used to brace herself reached down slowly, dipping between her legs. The breath that left her was stilted and shuddering as she felt the wetness against her folds, the sensitive throb of her clit. She let her fingers press harder, squeezing her eyes shut and muffling a sharp cry as she circled her clit, her back arching and her hips grinding down on their own accord.

Hot arousal burned within her, and it seemed to increase the pressure inside her stomach and she panted openly, her fingers flexing on the wall as she frantically bucked her hips into her hand. She came hard a few moments later, curling herself down into her open palm with a shuddering whine, the intense pleasure tearing through her as lights danced before her eyes.

Rinsing off while she caught her breath, Tess climbed out of the shower, the mirror catching the corner of her eye as she walked past it. She sighed. Slowly she turned, reaching out to wipe off the steam and gazed at her reflection. A lingering flush ruddied up her cheeks and darkened her freckles, but her eyes were wide, worried. She looked scared.

She turned to the side, letting her belly push out. She went to try and suck in, but it only increased the pressure and the feeling of tightness.

Something kicked again, but this time she did not touch it.

\----

 

When Tess kept getting bigger, when she was nearing seven months -- Christ, she still couldn’t believe it -- _pregnant_ , both her and Joel knew what was happening. But they never talked about it, never acknowledged it. It was a silent, mutual agreement.

Around her fifth month, they had called up on an old contact of hers, an older gentleman with dark skin and kind eyes, whose thick, slow drawl reflected his bayou roots. He was a respected veterinarian before the ‘break and his medical expertise had proven invaluable to her over the years. They had arrived under the cover of darkness, sneaking out after curfew with Tess bundled in one of Joel’s flannels, just to find out what they already knew.

Tess was undeniably pregnant -- they were going to have a baby.

They looked at each other. They’d deal with it when the time came, Joel’s gaze told her. It would be okay.

But still, they did not talk about it.

\----

 

_“Winter seeds,” she tittered, thick and dark and hot, “mean summer fruit.” She took a bite of the peach in her hand and offered it to him, its flesh shining wetly, torn by her teeth. Between them, her belly was gloriously swollen; round and ripe as the peach in hand, bursting with life the same._

_Joel flushed a bit, closing his fingers around her wrist, bringing the fruit to his mouth, biting down sharply as the juice ran down the corners of his mouth to nestle into his scruff. She watched him quietly, watched how his mouth had burned with hunger in her dark gaze._

_In a rare moment of affection, she leaned up, on the tips of her toes; her face hot and his breathless as she licked the crisp, sticky sweetness from the corner of his lip with her tongue, humming in the back of her throat._

A jolt, and Joel opened his eyes, coming back into his body; back into their bedroom made familiar under a high, yellow August moon.

He laid on his back with his head turned and gazed across at a sleeping Tess. The moonlight chased away some of the darkness of the bedroom, but shadows still stretched across it. She was lying on her side, facing him, her covers having been pulled down sometime during the night. Her pregnant belly - while on the smaller side, all things considered - looked huge and swollen against her willowy frame as it rested on the bed. Even in sleep, her brow was furrowed gently, as if the worries that plagued her in the day kept their place in her mind even as she rested; he wouldn’t be surprised. Her cheeks were softer now, fuller, only by so much, and it made his chest ache to think that they weren’t getting enough to feed her and keep their baby healthy.

It would be a summer baby, he thought. Born in the height of the longest days and rising temperatures.

He knew the shift in her body, though it had been but a lifetime ago - he remembered enough from a time when his ex-wife June had only ever wanted to eat ice-cream and mayo, of when even walking from room to room would leave her aching through the day. Here, they had no drugstores, no restaurants to chase cravings at, no doctors and medical supplies or pamphlets to read about home births and natural births and birthing alone.

Her old contact they’d gone and seen had given them a book; it was yellow and weathered with time, but it was all they had now. It was the only thing Tess kept by her bedside, like a Bible, reading by candlelight and scribbling in the margins when the baby wouldn’t let her sleep, or when the cramps in her calves were so intense she could only lie there and bite down on the pillows.

But - she never let him touch her.

That to Joel, hurt the most.

They hadn’t fucked in months. Joel knew Tess was worried, nearly sick with it, and he didn’t want to pressure her. He couldn’t tell her that he found the sight of her, swollen and heavy with their child, so perversely intoxicating; hell, he could barely admit it to himself -- that the thought made him hard, made him want, made him bitter and oh so frustrated. And frankly, he blamed his thoughts on her generous spirit; his wild, obscene fantasies blamed on the pride she’d so far taken to giving him more than he could ever ask for. But that was in the past. Now, it was just so goddamn hard when he could _hear_ her touching herself in the bathroom sometimes, hear the needy, broken sounds she made, without him being allowed near her enough to remedy them.

Tess shifted slightly, her hands clenching and unclenching in her slumber, an expression of discontent coloring her face. Joel’s brows knit in concern and he rolled to his side, quietly shifting closer to her. Brushing a lock of dark hair from her face, he studied her in the moonlight.

He hardly seemed to recognize her. Gone were the lines from their years of hardship -- of violence and loss and utter misery -- instead somehow smoothed over by sleep; slow, deep breaths falling rhythmically from her parted lips. The dark sweep of her lashes darted and fluttered against the apples of her high cheekbones, and a rather tawny flush on her dusky skin seemed to darken the faint spattering of freckles that dusted across the bridge of her nose like constellations. Though it was nothing new in the recent months, he still felt a wave of protectiveness when he saw how vulnerable - how _young_ she looked.

Breathing in, he reached down and rested his palm lightly against her stomach. Christ, it was still so strange to him, Tess having his baby, but at the same time… _she’s mine_ , he thought, and clung too fiercely. _And I’m hers._

But as always, there was more. _Mine and no one’s. Ours and yet neither of ours at all._ Almost against his will, he felt his fingers spreading out over smooth skin and rubbing in small circles, feeling intense motion underneath the warmth.

He jumped when she spoke. “Mmn -- Joel?” she rasped.

Swearing under his breath, he ripped his hand back nervously. “Yeah, s’me.”

“Jesus,” she sighed, her brow furrowing. She palmed her face wearily before sucking in a sharp breath on a flinch, one hand dropping immediately to her stomach, just left of where Joel’s hand had been.

Joel licked his lips. She didn’t seem angry at the fact that he’d been touching her, just uncomfortable.

“What’s wrong?” he asked her quietly.

“S’moving and - tight. Hurts,” she muttered.

Joel reached back down again, pressing his fingers gently into Tess’s abdomen. Shit, she was right. Her belly had tightened and felt hard as a rock now, nothing like what he’d felt just a few moments ago. As he pressed a bit harder, it slowly softened under his fingertips again. “Tess, we need to -- “

“No,” she grunted. “S’okay, they’re not -- not the real ones.”

“Hm,” he nodded, moving his hand slightly. “Can I?” he whispered.

Her eyes flicked up and met his own, her expression softening a bit. “Yeah,” she said, her voice hushed.

Joel started rubbing her belly, the skin supple under his hand. “What’s it feel like?” he asked, massaging softly.

She blew out a breath, almost squirming under his touch. “Like I got a boulder sitting on me sometimes, keeps rollin’ around and - wriggling inside me. Makes it feel so fucking tight and… full, and when something -- god, the _baby_ \-- moves inside of me, it kind of hurts sometimes, but then…” She trailed off, and he felt her skin suddenly grow warmer under his palm.

“Then what?” he prodded her gently, his hand skirting when he felt more movement inside her.

She looked away, and he saw the freckles on her cheekbones darkened in a flush. The silence stretched between them before she finally answered. “I -- Joel, it fucking turns me on, okay?”

He pulled back slightly, swallowing thickly.

“Really.”

“‘s the - the hormones or something, I think,” Tess moved her hand to the side of her swollen belly.

His breath caught in his throat. “Can - I can help you, y’know… with that. If uh, ‘f you wanted me to.”

She blinked at him slowly. “Well, dunno how you’re gonna make it stop kicking me so damn mu-- “

“Can fuck you,” he whispered hoarsely, so low it was almost a growl. “I can make it better -- can make you come.” The words tumbled out in a breathless rush as he felt his cock harden. _Fuck, please, please, please._

“Jesus, _yes_ ,” she said, rubbing her belly a few times before taking her hand away. “Christ - Joel, _yes_.”

The noise that left his mouth was _obscene_ : a curling, aching thing that shaded into a thick, wet groan.

His lips were on hers, suddenly, all teeth and tongue with her belly wedged between them, and his fingertips bit into the swell of her ass and she moaned into his mouth, her mind completely blank of all thought but him and the burning in her core.

When he wedged his thigh between her legs, she was already rocking against him, thrusting against his hips. His lips skimmed down her neck, teeth nipping, and he groaned with his tongue laving against her pulse at how wet she was already, even through her panties. He skirted his fingers over the soaked material, spreading her open through the cotton and tracing a finger along the leaking seam of her opening up to her clit, pulling a ragged, desperate groan from her and a wild buck of her hips.

A whimper pulled from her throat as he pulled away and climbed to his knees, despite how much she tried to cling to him, tried to pull him back because the need for release in her was coiled so tight, plateaued when his hands gripped her hips and he hefted her over to her back, ripping off her panties and stuffing a pillow underneath her. His fingertips drifted across her inner thighs and tickled the sensitive skin, making her clit pulse in anticipation. His cock throbbed painfully when the moonlight hit her pink folds that glistened with arousal.

“You sore?” he asked, his hand slipping from her thigh to rest on her belly. She whined and managed to arch forward just enough for the tip of his finger to brush against her clit.

His finger traced her slit, catching her juices. “Nnmm -- all over. My back and shoulders ‘nd legs - m-my tits, god,” she gasped.

“Mm, y’look full up, can tell. Jesus, Tess.”

“It kicks all the time. Feel the elbows and the knees, especially at night or when -- when I’m horny. Hormones’re making me crazy for it.”

He rucked up her grimy tank top and reached a hand to roll a pebbled nipple in between his fingers, his breath hitching when he saw a bead -- pearly, faintly milky-white -- squeeze out and roll down the swell of her breast.

“Hhhffuck, look at you,” he breathed. Without thinking, he leaned forward to catch the bead in his mouth, tracing its path back to the peak of a dusky nipple and sucking gently. A sudden thickness flowed in his mouth -- not very sweet, not yet, but still enough to make his face grow hot.

“S-sorry -- “ he stuttered, pulling back to stop, but her fingers knotted in his hair immediately to hold him there. She thrusted her chest forward, breathing hard, her cheeks nearly as red as his.

“No, ‘s -- god, c’mon, _please_.”

He blinked at her; he didn’t need to be told twice. Without a moment’s hesitation, he leaned forward again to press his lips to her breast, suckling gently.

Tess arched with a ragged, wanton cry and pushed her breast further into his mouth, her head snapping back against the pillow and her fingers tightening in his hair to hold him there, to keep him at her breast for his tongue and teeth to lavish. His moans reverberated through her, through every sensitive, overstimulated nerve in her body, from her nipples to her core to the tips of her toes that curled against nothing.

His finger slipped inside her sopping core and his calloused thumb found her clit, flicking it once and then rubbing in a tight circle. A second finger joined the first, both curling inside her to whiten her vision and that was all it took.

She came apart on a stuttering gasp and a sloppy thrust of her hips, desperate little whines escaping her throat as she clenched around his fingers, her thighs shaking, the overwhelming pleasure burning and vibrating through her entire body.

“Fuck, Tessa,” he hissed. His own voice was nearly unrecognizable to him. Joel swallowed dryly, his tongue felt thick and impossibly heavy in his mouth. He felt dirty somehow, filthy -- like he shouldn’t be enjoying this as much as he was, _because_ of the reason that he was. But god, he just couldn’t _stop._

His groan had her peeling her eyes open to find him staring at where his thumb was circling her clit, at the now-barely visible muscles of her stomach that clenched and fluttered simultaneously with both aftershock and their child inside her.

Tess groaned, doing her best to lift her ass up higher. “Joel, I need - fuck me,” she whimpered, the words hard in her soft mouth, her hands moving to her swollen stomach and rubbing furiously over the bulges that were appearing.

He smeared her open with both thumbs this time, curling his fingers back into her. “So tight, Tess -- Christ, haven’t fucked you in _ages_.”

His cock bobbed heavily between them and she felt her muscles clench as the weight of it rested on her folds. She needed him, she was _aching_ for him.

“Fast -- need it fast,” she panted, struggling to worm a hand down to grab at him, to guide him into her when he curled his fingers around her thighs and splayed them open. He slipped in easily, pressing deeply and she bucked against the sheets with a ragged cry, a moan tugging from deep within his chest too as he let his head fall to her shoulder. He listened to the sound of her breaths coming fast and sharp, desperate as she tried to adjust to the feeling of him stretching her open. She was so _tight_ , so beautifully tight and slick and hot like fire around his cock, pressing into places inside her he hadn’t felt in months. This drew him in deeper, until there was pain mixed with pleasure at each rough, stuttering thrust, and her breath was stuck in her throat and there were stars behind her eyes. His lips found her neck and sucked greedily as he began to pound into her, fucking her hard into the mattress.

Her hands found the flexing muscle of his back, nails cutting down into skin, the pain lancing through him like electric flames as he bore his teeth into her neck and growled. His hips were moving with as much brutal strength as he dared to put into each thrust, his body molding to accommodate the upturned curve of her belly. Joel could feel the slick sweat building between their bodies, the friction of where her belly was pressing to his hips, the kick and squirm of his baby inside her as he forced her into another sobbing orgasm.

He couldn’t think, he only wanted. Wanted and wanted and he was spiralling; a heavy, hot-white coil sharpening in his gut, balls tightening with every stroke. The sensation twisted; her belly a foreign pressure against them both. He moaned, writhing against it, and then his release tore through him with a rough, obliterating squeeze, strong enough to drag a plea from his lips as he clung to her desperately.

Something in her snapped when she heard the rough, choking cry of her name - always her name - the consonants of it dragged out long and low as a hiss through his teeth. It was all suddenly too much; his hands on her skin, his body pressed to hers, the suffocating weight of him leaning into her belly. He was all around her, consuming her, collapsing her world into a pinpoint of his body and hers, and Tess felt a rush a panic tighten in her muscles.

She couldn’t.

She _couldn’t._

His hands came to brace on her belly, rubbing where the baby was kicking madly inside her, and Tess felt a rush of irritation and shame prickle on her skin. She pressed her palms to his chest and shoved him backwards suddenly, shoving him out and off of her in a rush of startled words. She yanked the covers up around her body. Somehow the swell of her belly only seemed all the more ridiculous beneath the white.

Joel reeled back in alarm, stumbling to his side a moment as he blinked rapidly, face morphing from shock and bewilderment to fear and worry. The sudden cold was sharp against his skin and even colder against his teeth, and he breathed hard in confusion.

“Did I hurt ya?” he asked her anxiously, reaching out to touch her again. “I didn’t hurt ya, did I? Is it the baby??” His fingers ghosted the material of the sheets and Joel startled when Tess recoiled from him again. He swallowed the lump in his throat and stared at her face beseechingly.

“I’m sorry,” he blurted. “I didn’t - I didn’t mean to hurt you. I shouldn’t have pressed down so hard, I shoulda - shoulda let you get on top.”

“S’fine,” she rasped, curling herself tighter under the confining layer of blankets and into herself. “I’m fine, just - “

She scrubbed a hand over her face and breathed heavily, blinking hard at the blank spaces on the wall. Joel wondered if he shouldn’t gather her up like he always did after they fucked - if he would feel the weight of their child pressed firmly between their bodies.

Shame cracked him squarely between his shoulder blades like a bullwhip - but he chose instead to lie still in the suffocating silence that stretched between them. His cock softened between his legs, smeared in their combined wetness, and he could see the remnants of his release slick on her thighs and spread in streaks through the thatch of hair above her pussy.

“Here -” he moved off the bed, padding quietly into the darkness of their bathroom. Tess heard the faucet run briefly, and the shadow of him came into the light with a damp little towel.

Her fingers clenched over the sheets briefly, but Tess held herself achingly still as he gently tugged the covers down. She jolted at the cold touch, but held herself in place long enough for Joel to run the cloth gently over her thighs and under the swell of her belly. There was a strange, constricting sensation gripping her chest; he was so _gentle_.

“‘m fine,” she muttered eventually, gingerly pushing the towel from her skin. The chill was setting back into her skin, goosebumps riddling her skin, and Tess tugged the covers back up, over her belly, up under her chin.

Joel sat back, words on his face but none from his lips as he carefully laid himself down beside her, cloth abandoned onto the bedside table. He said nothing yet; only pressed himself tentatively in beside her, letting one arm come around her body.

“Y’gonna be alright?” He nosed it into the diamond of her neck and tried to pretend he didn’t feel her stiffen under his touch, the coarse bristles of his beard like dulled sandpaper against her skin. He tried to lay his hand over her belly, to touch where he knew the baby was still fussing inside her, but Tess snatched his hand in hers.

She pushed his hand off her stomach, patting it gingerly where it cupped her hip instead.

He frowned worriedly. "Tess?"

Tess bit her lip, sinking teeth hard enough to sting. There was no escaping her pregnancy - not now, and probably not ever, but somehow his outward acceptance of it was just too much.

“Yeah - yeah. I’ll be okay,” she said, the quiet, reassuring tone hoping to mask the whirling unease she felt.

It didn’t work, and he didn’t sleep.

  
They both saw the lie for what it was.


End file.
